The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) is to honour University of Limerick lecturer Brenda Romero at its flagship games awards next week.

BAFTA this morning announced that award-winning game designer and artist Brenda Romero will be presented with the Special Award at the British Academy Games Awards on Thursday, April 6.

BAFTA’s Special Award acknowledges an individual for their creative contribution to the industry, and will be presented to Brenda for her illustrious career in game design, her advocacy for the art and creative process behind game-making, and her commitment to encouraging the next generation of talent in the industry.

According to Nick Button-Brown, Chair of BAFTA’s Games Committee: "Brenda is such a great role model for people wanting to enter the industry and her advocacy for the excellence of creativity within the Games industry helps us all. Given the work that BAFTA does on helping people get into the games industry, having Brenda as such an eloquent advocate is fantastic”.

Brenda Romero said: “I am first and foremost grateful to BAFTA for recognising the artistic potential and power of games. This recognition is culturally critical for games overall. So for that, I am profoundly thankful. As for me? Genuinely, I am still in a state of shock, having been chosen. I’ve devoted my life to games - making them, teaching them, playing them - and to receive any honour from the community is incredible. But a BAFTA? It’s well beyond anything else".

Brenda Romero first entered the video game industry in 1981. As a designer, she has worked on 47 games and contributed to many seminal titles, including the Wizardry and Jagged Alliance series, titles in the Def Jam franchise and the BAFTA-winning Ghost Recon and Dungeons & Dragons series.

Her analogue series of six games, The Mechanic is the Message, has drawn national and international acclaim, particularly Train and Siochán Leat (The Irish Game) which is presently housed in the National Museum of Play.

In 2013, she was named one of the top 10 game developers by Gamasutra.com and Develop magazine listed her among the 25 people who changed games in that year. In 2014, she received a Fulbright award to study Ireland’s game industry, academic and government policies. In 2015, she won the coveted Ambassador’s Award at the Game Developers Choice Awards. This year, she will be awarded the 2017 Development Legend at the Develop Industry Excellence Awards.

Ms Romero co-owns Romero Games based in Galway and is Course Director at the University of Limerick MSc in Game Design & Development.